Until now, as hinge devices for connecting two members pivotally and bringing the two members from a closed state in which they are face-to-face to an open state in which their facing faces are spread like an open book, ones having various different constructions have been in use, and for example their use in electrical appliances has been proposed.
However, among hinge devices for performing an opening and closing movement of the kind described above the majority are single-axis ones, and in the case of constructions that bring both facing faces to an open state in which they are spread like an open book and for example as the closed state the two members can be brought face-to-face and the opening movement can be performed with the upper faces of the members facing in substantially the same direction throughout and the upper face of one of the members can be made to incline with respect to the upper face of the other member, it is necessary to adopt a 2-axis construction, but there was the problem that in ones of a 2-axis construction the joining device tends to become bulky as set forth in Patent Document 1. Furthermore, there was also the problem that a special structure for making it possible to incline the upper face of one of the members with respect to the upper face of the other member was necessary.
Patent Document 1
U.S. Pat. No. 3,189,818 which is also cited as JP 2000196720.